Informed Comment Homepage

Thoughts on the Middle East, History and Religion

Header Right

  • Featured
  • US politics
  • Middle East
  • Environment
  • US Foreign Policy
  • Energy
  • Economy
  • Politics
  • About
  • Archives
  • Submissions

© 2025 Informed Comment

  • Skip to content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Juan Cole

Featured
“Tell me how this ends” – Gaza Edition

“Tell me how this ends” – Gaza Edition

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – General David Petraeus, as he prepared to help lead an invasion of Iraq, famously asked journalist Rick Atkinson, “Tell me how this ends.” No one doubted that the US could invade and occupy Iraq. It just wasn’t clear even to insiders what the US could possibly do to get back […]

Featured
The Plague as Life: 327,000 Stricken with Infectious Diseases in Gaza

The Plague as Life: 327,000 Stricken with Infectious Diseases in Gaza

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – In Albert Camus’ novel The Plague, a character at one point asks, “But what does it mean, the plague? It’s life, that’s all.” The plague has come to Gaza. What happens when you force 1.8 million people into a postage-stamp-sized territory and destroy or damage half of their dwelling places, […]

Featured
Why did Biden suddenly accuse Israel of War Crimes in Gaza?

Why did Biden suddenly accuse Israel of War Crimes in Gaza?

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – On Tuesday, President Joe Biden de facto accused Israel of war crimes in Gaza. He said at a donor event, “Israel’s security can rest on the United States, but right now it has more than the United States. It has the European Union, it has Europe, it has most of […]

Authoritarianism
Elise Stefanik, proponent of Great Replacement Theory, is no Foe of Racial Bigotry against Jews or Anyone Else

Elise Stefanik, proponent of Great Replacement Theory, is no Foe of Racial Bigotry against Jews or Anyone Else

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) does not care about antisemitism. In the notorious congressional hearing in which she participated last week, she weaponized anti-Palestinian, anti-Arab and anti-Muslim hatred in order to embarrass three university presidents with dishonest “have you stopped beating your spouse?” questions — pretending to do so in order […]

Featured
Half of Palestinians in Gaza are now Starving;  Depriving Civilians of Food is a War Crime

Half of Palestinians in Gaza are now Starving; Depriving Civilians of Food is a War Crime

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The United Nations warned on Saturday that half the population of Gaza is now starving. The World Food Programme (WFP) had reported at the end of November that in the north of Gaza, about half of the people were suffering “severe levels of hunger.” Meanwhile, nearly everyone had inadequate levels […]

Featured
On How Israeli/US War Crimes in Gaza are orders of Magnitude Worse than those of Russia in Ukraine

On How Israeli/US War Crimes in Gaza are orders of Magnitude Worse than those of Russia in Ukraine

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Biden administration has spent most of its diplomatic energy since the February 24, 2022, Russian invasion of Ukraine marshaling the world to punish the Russian Federation, to boycott its petroleum and gas, to seize assets even of private citizens in Europe and North America, and to make Russia a […]

Anti-intellectualism
The Other Israel-Gaza Conflict: On Campus (Juan at Dawn)

The Other Israel-Gaza Conflict: On Campus (Juan at Dawn)

Juan Cole

Excerpted from Dawn (Democracy for the Arab World Now) Israel’s total war on Gaza, following Hamas’s horrific terrorist attack on Oct. 7, has roiled higher education in the United States. The atrocities committed by Hamas in southern Israel two months ago have reverberated on many U.S. campuses, deeply traumatizing many Jewish students. But so too […]

Featured
Russian Roulette: Doctors w/out Borders Demand Immediate Ceasefire as Hospitals turned into "Morgues"

Russian Roulette: Doctors w/out Borders Demand Immediate Ceasefire as Hospitals turned into “Morgues”

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Doctors without Borders (the French volunteer organization Médecins Sans Frontières [MSF]) has written a poignant letter to the United Nations Security Council imploring for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. They took this step after Israeli troops deliberately attacked MSF rescue vehicles and destroyed them with tank fire. Making the shotMaking […]

Featured
This is a War on Children, and "Safe Zones" are Death Traps:  UNICEF

This is a War on Children, and “Safe Zones” are Death Traps: UNICEF

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Gaza was a free-fire zone on Saturday and Sunday, with UN officials saying that no place in the Strip is safe. Hundreds were killed, almost all of them innocent noncombatants, and including a worrisome number of children. Although Israel tried to pull the stunt of issuing a map with supposedly […]

  • « Previous Page
  • Page 1
  • …
  • Page 38
  • Page 39
  • Page 40
  • Page 41
  • Page 42
  • …
  • Page 1596
  • Next Page »

Primary Sidebar

Support Independent Journalism

Click here to donate via PayPal.

Personal checks should be made out to Juan Cole and sent to me at:

Juan Cole
P. O. Box 4218,
Ann Arbor, MI 48104-2548
USA
(Remember, make the checks out to “Juan Cole” or they can’t be cashed)

STAY INFORMED

Join our newsletter to have sharp analysis delivered to your inbox every day.
Warning! Social media will not reliably deliver Informed Comment to you. They are shadowbanning news sites, especially if "controversial."
To see new IC posts, please sign up for our email Newsletter.

Social Media

Bluesky | Instagram

Popular

  • American Psycho: Trump's Delusional Crusade Transforms America into a Pariah State
  • Antisemitism Awareness Act – Protecting Jews from What?
  • When Politics Leaves Reality Behind
  • The Real Evil Empire May Surprise You
  • Israeli plan to occupy all of Gaza could open the Door for Annexation of the West Bank

Gaza Yet Stands


Juan Cole's New Ebook at Amazon. Click Here to Buy
__________________________

Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires



Click here to Buy Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires.

The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam


Click here to Buy The Rubaiyat.
Sign up for our newsletter

Informed Comment © 2025 All Rights Reserved